The small state of Rhode Island may have found an innovative way to save money while providing better care with better results. They’re paying loved ones – like family members – to stay at home and take care of the elderly.

Robyn Stone served in the Clinton White House as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Disability, Aging and Long-term Care Policy and is now the Executive Director of the Leading Age Center for Applied Research. Find out more about long-term care and other pressing medical issues from the series Prescription America.

The new policy is designed to combat “excess readmissions.” It went into effect this past October as part of the Affordable Care Act – meant to save the government more than a quarter billion dollars just over the next year.

This week we look at an element of the healthcare reform package designed to improve care for the elderly once they have been released from the hospital. The idea is simple: medicare payments to hospitals would be withheld, if older patients are readmitted too often, too soon. The plan is to encourage more coordinated care [...]

If anything, the debate about Medicare has been tame compared to the debate about healthcare. Almost from the start of the Obama administration, the two parties have been at war about the wisdom, legality and practicality of The Affordable Care Act.

Need to Know is a production of Creative News Group (CNG) in association with WNET. Marc Rosenwasser is Executive Producer. Need to Know is made possible by Bernard and Irene Schwartz, Mutual of America, Citi Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Foundation, Margaret A. Cargill Foundation, The Corporation for Public Broadcasting and PBS.